On Monday night, we had another harsh storm move through and during that, we decided to figure out why our air conditioner wasn't working. At 2 in the morning.
Then, down the basement stairs, I discovered a visitor and Daddy informed me he brought some friends in the basement too. Everybody likes the doggie door, apparently. It was a little toad and if both of Bailey's bug boxes had not been outside in the pouring down rain amidst all the lightning, maybe, just maybe I would've retrieved one so I could put a little toad inside as a surprise.
After not enough sleep, the next morning I awoke to much nicer weather outside and immediately ran out back to grab a bug box and went downstairs. I was disappointed to not find a little intruder and just when I'd given up, there he was. Bailey was so excited and thanked me profusely for her new pet. She deemed him King Toad and they were about to embark on many fabulous journeys together.
I was doing something (who knows what) and Bailey pulls me away with the words, "He got away. He just hopped away." Considering that little guy was supposed (emphasis on "SUPPOSED") to be in his little bug container, I was really not amused. She pointed behind the entertainment center, so I took her word for it and started there. Luckily, there he was and we put him back into the container and again they could go on all of those fabulous adventures, whatever they might be. Among those, they hung out in the little house together as she played Scientist Bailey.
I was going to write about it soon after that, but I didn't get to it and later that evening, Daddy and Bailey found him a friend. Bailey was so happy to have matching toads. She liked her "brother" and "sister" toads. She could even tell you which was one which, although I'm thinking she was just speculating. And then suddenly, she decided it was time to let them go and away they hopped. They were thrilled to be released. You could just tell.
So, then we were snail hunting and one of the toads made the mistake of treading in snail territory and again was captured and spent the night back in the habitat. I'm sure he was just hating himself. I kind of felt sorry for the little guy, but that's what you get. He should've ran when he had the chance. He wasn't getting away this time.
Now, thestory was supposed to stop there. I was going to write about it, and obviously, again did not. So when I awoke THIS morning to Bailey announcing before 7 am that her toad was missing, I was a little incapacitated. And by the looks of things, she'd been awake for quite a while because she had fully dressed herself in some very interesting attire (which maybe someday I'll prove to you). She claimed he got out by himself and I immediately crawled out of bed to solve the case.
The container was indeed empty. I asked her if she took him out and she swore she didn't and as we searched the premises, I went to turn the living room lights on and behold, there was King Toad in the rocking chair (but not with a candle stick). I wondered if he rocked himself to sleep, but when I picked him up, something seemed odd. Bailey took him from me and casually carried him to the door since I'd told her we needed to take him outside now. She went along with the plan and when she set him in the strawberry patch, I realized my theory was correct. King Toad was no longer living. I shared my theory with Bailey and she seemed to understand (that kid can tell you all about death, even though we've never explained it to her).
Later, I wasn't happy to find that King Toad was back in the bug habitat again. I asked her how he magically appeared and she had taken him from outside and placed him back in there because she wanted to keep him. I finally convinced her we needed to return him to the great outdoors as his body was now kind of looking scary and oddly discolored. She agreed to give him a proper burial and did it all by herself. I was just glad to no longer see her handling a dead amphibian inside the house, holding onto it like it possessed some kind of morbid sentimentality.
King Toad is now buried and will remain in our thoughts until another one comes and another one gets away. Although technically, he didn't get away in the end.
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